16-inch MacBook Pro • Hacker News Board

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#671

Post by csomar » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 6:57 PM UTC

This is too irresistible not to upgrade. I'm more interested in CPU/Memory and the Graphic card bump is only $100. In total, it should cost $3.900 excluding taxes (or $2.500 if I "trade in" my current machine). Looking at the competition, a ThinkPad P53 Mobile Workstation with the 2.3Ghz processor / 32GB of RAM will cost $3.759.

I think the pricing is very competitive, given that the ThinkPad is a giant box. So even if Lenovo lowers its price in the next iteration of its ThinkPad, the MacbookPro will quite match up.

Kudos for Apple for doing this!

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#672

Post by kraig911 » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 6:58 PM UTC

Still wish it had a touch screen. The physical escape key is nice. The fact I can hackintosh a touch screen dell xps to see if my app's gestures work etc is just so crazy why they won't give in.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#673

Post by rurp » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 6:59 PM UTC

gigatexal wrote: post #65

htk wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel the same. The stubbornness of Apple that was so frustrating is a bit more flexible now, paying attention to "subtle" feedback like the arrow key's sizes.

We devs are so conservative. It's ridiculous. Nobody allows Apple to innovate.

Change for the sake of change isn't innovation, it's a waste of time.

Spending hours fiddling with a dysfunctional keyboard that breaks after a week of normal use or has a gimmicky non-standard layout is not how I want to spend my finite time and mental energy.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#674

Post by GVIrish » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 6:59 PM UTC

a13n wrote: post #536

blhack wrote: post #373

It's hilarious to me that their own marketing image has two dongles plugged into the laptop so that the user can still use USB. Apple please for the love of usability: please give me back USB. I AM the pro that you want to feature in every one of your marketing videos. I have a music studio in my house, I build interactive lighting installations for the biggest music festivals in the world, I build custom hardware co…

I think the long game here is that USB will shift towards USB-C. Plenty of new Windows devices have USB-C ports, and it's only a matter of time until peripheral manufacturers transition over and the old USB ports become useless.

The long game may trend towards USB-C, but in the meantime Apple made the Macbook Pro less usable for people who want to do actual work. How is it better to have to manage a bag full of dongles when Apple easily could've included the ports that people frequently use like SD and USB-A?

It was a bad decision 2 years ago when they introduced this generation of Macbook Pros, and it's still a bad decision.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#675

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:01 PM UTC

csomar wrote: post #671

This is too irresistible not to upgrade. I'm more interested in CPU/Memory and the Graphic card bump is only $100. In total, it should cost $3.900 excluding taxes (or $2.500 if I "trade in" my current machine). Looking at the competition, a ThinkPad P53 Mobile Workstation with the 2.3Ghz processor / 32GB of RAM will cost $3.759. I think the pricing is very competitive, given that the ThinkPad is a giant box. So even…

[deleted]

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#676

Post by dang » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:01 PM UTC

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21526058 has few comments but points to a long interview with Phil Schiller that has some interesting things but (brace yourself) says basically nothing about the touch bar.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#677

Post by GVIrish » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:02 PM UTC

ctdonath wrote: post #488

blhack wrote: post #373

It's hilarious to me that their own marketing image has two dongles plugged into the laptop so that the user can still use USB. Apple please for the love of usability: please give me back USB. I AM the pro that you want to feature in every one of your marketing videos. I have a music studio in my house, I build interactive lighting installations for the biggest music festivals in the world, I build custom hardware co…

I've observed that sentiment applied to innumerable interfaces for decades. Interfaces change. The change is painful, but moves us forward to better.

Interfaces change, but making the switch too early makes it needlessly painful. I mean, how does it make sense that Apple's own iPhone and iPad don't plug directly into Macbooks without a dongle?

I mean, why stop there? Apple could just go to zero ports and force everyone to use Wi-Fi peripherals. They could sell a wi-fi peripheral hub for backwards compatibility. Then they could get rid of the power port and use inductive charging. That would make for an insanely sleek machine, even if it were insanely painful to use.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#678

Post by munificent » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:02 PM UTC

Reason077 wrote: post #347

throwanem wrote: post #17

I'm astonished and pleased to see they walked back the two worst things about the original Touch Bar MBPs - the lack of a physical Escape key, and the full-size left and right arrow keys. The lack of physical function keys remains regrettable, and the Touch Bar is still no worthy substitute, but perhaps this is a sign that Apple is finally interested in listening to feedback from its long-term customer base, even if…

> "the two worst things about the original Touch Bar MBPs - the lack of a physical Escape key, and the full-size left and right arrow keys." The "butterfly mechanism" keyboards are awful, unreliable, and get worse with time, so I'm very glad to see them go. Likewise, the return of the physical Escape key is very welcome. But honestly, the design of the arrow keys has never bothered me in the slightest. If anything, t…

I hate the full-size left and right arrow keys because it means I can't easily use my sense of touch to find the arrow keys. I mistype them all the time now, even after months of use. That was never a problem with the previous inverted-T design.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#679

Post by munificent » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:04 PM UTC

insta_anon wrote: post #242

Can someone explain to me how Apple can justify only including a 720p FaceTime HD camera into the "the world’s best pro notebook"? The last iPhone that had this FaceTime camera was the 6S, released in 2015. Since the iPhone 7 (2016) the phones have had at least a 1080p FaceTime camera. Given that FaceTime / Skype calls are such a common use case and rarely anyones uses external webcams anymore, why doesn't Apple use…

The camera is in the screen half of the laptop, which is thinner than your phone.

Re: 16-inch MacBook Pro

#680

Post by munificent » Wed, Nov 13, 2019, 7:06 PM UTC

a13n wrote: post #536

blhack wrote: post #373

It's hilarious to me that their own marketing image has two dongles plugged into the laptop so that the user can still use USB. Apple please for the love of usability: please give me back USB. I AM the pro that you want to feature in every one of your marketing videos. I have a music studio in my house, I build interactive lighting installations for the biggest music festivals in the world, I build custom hardware co…

I think the long game here is that USB will shift towards USB-C. Plenty of new Windows devices have USB-C ports, and it's only a matter of time until peripheral manufacturers transition over and the old USB ports become useless.

That's what they said about ADB to USB, USB to Micro-USB, Micro-USB to USB-C. Once everyone settles on USB-C, some new thing will come out that necessitates yet another port change. So much for "Universal".